


Crown of Leaves

by goddessbastet



Category: Mushishi
Genre: Trypophobia Warning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-13
Updated: 2016-08-13
Packaged: 2018-08-08 12:13:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7757428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goddessbastet/pseuds/goddessbastet
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ginko becomes host to an unknown mushi that seems to cause plants to grow out of his skin. His attempts to rid himself of it end up fruitless.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Crown of Leaves

Ginko paused, the leaves and dirt shifting slightly underfoot, and raised his lantern. Despite the light, the gloom seemed to weigh heavily on the trees around him. Crouching like a massive, ethereal beast, parted only by a halo of light from a lantern.  
The candlelight reflected off the surface of a pond, the image distorted and shifting. Half-swallowed by the darkness beside the pond was a small hut, overrun and decrepit.

  
"...I guess I'll stop here for the night."

  
Ginko settled quietly beside the hut, putting out his lantern and setting up his bedroll. He hardly needed the light from the lantern, capable of seeing clearly in the darkness, and only used it so as to not be confused for an animal by hunters.  
That had happened before, and it was not something he'd rather repeat. Leaning on the wooden frame of the hut to finish his cigarette, he turned his gaze to the pond.  
He hardly paid attention, just watching the starlight dance on the water, until he saw a flicker of movement under the surface.

  
_"A fish?"_

  
He glanced around, searching for the source of the movement, but saw nothing. He thought it had been pure white; Unusual, for a fish.  
Ginko relaxed again, and eventually his cigarette burned out, leaving him only in starlight. He closed his eyes for just a moment, drifting off, but a voice woke him.

  
"Yoki."

  
He turned his head, finding himself staring at a woman with long white hair and a bright green eye matching the leaves around her.  
Ginko found he couldn't speak. She approached him slowly, speaking softly, but her words weren't a single sentence. They were instead a chorus of clipped phrases he'd never heard before, each one barely distinguishable from the rest. She was walking closer and yet remaining in the same place, her words and the thick darkness growing around her becoming disorienting.  
Ginko found himself turning his head, watching the pond, as white one-eyed fish swam aimlessly. She spoke clearly again, but only a single word.

  
"Yoki."

  
Ginko jolted awake and sat up.

  
_"When did I fall asleep..?"_

  
He was lying in his bedroll, though he swore he'd just been sitting against the hut. He was drenched with sweat, his heart pounding in his throat and his hair sticking to his face.  
Ginko glanced around, but the dream quickly faded from his memory, and he could soon barely remember what the woman's face had looked like.  
He got to his feet, noting the dim blue sky along the patches of horizon that showed through the trees. He must've been asleep for several hours, though it certainly didn't feel like it.  
Ginko crouched by the water's edge, searching again for the white fish he'd seen- Had he seen them, or was it only a dream?  
He splashed the cool water in his face and sighed, and then went to gather his bedroll and medicine box.  
A few hours of traveling in the calm morning light earned him proper distraction from his disorienting dream, and by the time he stopped again to eat breakfast, his mood had improved.

  
Several days later, the dream was entirely forgotten; Ginko was used to strange experiences, both as a mushishi and as one who attracted beings close to life itself.  
But when he paused by a creek to get water, he noticed something against the inside of his sleeve. Pushing it up, he found green plants growing along the inside of his wrist.  
He stared for a moment, and then brushed his fingertips against them. They seemed to be normal plants, with no mushi-like qualities. He followed one with his fingertip, the bright green stalk visible for a short distance under his skin before vanishing like his veins did.  
There seemed to be no more of them, as Ginko checked his other arm and legs.  
After he had dug through the scrolls in his medicine box and tried a handful of remedies that worked on similar mushi, with no effect, he tentatively tried tugging on one. It was, to his surprise, not painful, and he tugged on it further. The sensation of pulling the plant out from under his skin was unpleasant, making him shudder somewhat, but it came free easily. The blood on the very end of it was his only concern, and a small amount of blood was oozing out of the hole left by the plant.

  
He dabbed it with cloth, noting it was slightly sore, but otherwise fine. Before moving onto the others, Ginko studied the one he'd pulled out. It did not seem to have blood in it, so he found it unlikely that it was draining it from him- But perhaps it was simply only taking water, like a normal plant would.  
Having never heard of such a phenomenon himself, he wrote down his findings, and considered that the plants themselves were simply being caused by a mushi in his body.

  
Ginko spent the day studying his arm and the plants, trying to think of some side effect besides the presence of the plants, but could find nothing. He was hesitant to try any sort of plant-killer, as the plants seemed to be directly attached to his veins. He didn't want to risk making himself sick.  
In the end, when he had exhausted all other possibilities besides contacting other mushishi, he plucked the plants from his arm and saved them. Ginko planned to visit Tanyuu, and view the records in an attempt to discover the cause of the plants.  
Over the next few days, Ginko carefully monitored himself as he traveled, checking the holes riddling his arm to see if the plants would grow back and trying to find any adverse effects from pulling them out.

  
But not long after, as he slid his medicine box from his back to take a break, he noticed his shirt pulling against something and touched his hand to the nape of his neck. He felt plants there, and touched along his shoulders and back to find many more.  
Ginko pulled one along his neck out, shivering as it came out, and found the roots were far longer than the ones along his wrist. The plant, however, was otherwise identical, even when he looked closer at it. Attempting again to pull another plant from his shoulder, he found it was stuck, something larger moving under his skin and a few of the plants near it being tugged on. The roots were connected, and yet they still did not hurt him.

  
He let the plants be, and instead made haste for Tanyuu's. It would be a long journey, but he was overdue for a visit anyway.

**Author's Note:**

> Written at 4 AM and hastily revised the next night. Hope you enjoyed the first chapter!


End file.
